9 May—The bad news: La Conservatissima hasn’t come through with any good things to say about Donald Trump. Nor indeed has any other Trump admirer, although, as you’ve seen, one brave soul tried but just couldn’t think of any. Disappointing, to say the least. Come on, La, you must have something good to say about your hero, rather than just rip his critics.

The good news: Donald Trump won’t be visiting or coming anywhere near Litchfield when he befouls and embarrasses the Coast Guard Academy graduation ceremony on the other side of the state on 20 May. As far as we can determine, no sitting president has ever visited Litchfield, although General George Washington slept here, at Sheldon’s Tavern, one night in 1780 when he was passing through, along with the Marquis de Lafayette and Alexander Hamilton, on their way to Tappan, New York, from Hartford. Separate rooms, presumably, since Lieutenant Colonel Hamilton was Washington’s aide-de-camp and young (22-year-old) Lafayette was a major general.

(Apropos nothing, in the 2024 presidential election, Litchfield only narrowly preferred Kamala Harris over Donald Trump, 2,660 to 2,545.)

The scoop: Our roving photographer, who’s always on the qui vive, was able to catch a defiantly insouciant Donald Trump in a full-dress rehearsal just yesterday for his 80^th birthday extravaganza planned for 14 June. The war-criminal-in-chief was accompanied by his chief war-criminal flunky Pete Hegseth, who wasn’t too happy about being caught at the top-secret full-dress rehearsal on Pennsylvania Avenue, as well as his overtly criminal flunky Kash Patel and his covertly criminal flunky JD Vance . . .